


Harrowing

by isingonly4myangel



Category: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina (TV 2018)
Genre: Harrowing, depictions of hanging, zelda as a child
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-04
Updated: 2020-11-04
Packaged: 2021-03-08 21:07:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27383182
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isingonly4myangel/pseuds/isingonly4myangel
Summary: "It was traditional. A rite of passage, Edward had said. A bit of harmless fun that she would soon get to be on the other side of, Faustus told her. Everyone did it, Shirley assured her."Zelda was Harrowed when she first started at the Academy. By her own brother, no less.
Relationships: Edward Spellman & Zelda Spellman
Comments: 2
Kudos: 11





	Harrowing

**Author's Note:**

> Written for a prompt request on Tumblr! 
> 
> This is pretty dark, fair warning. Apologies if anyone studies Latin- I do not, and I had only the internet to help me. The other language is fictional and I only borrowed it!

It was traditional. A rite of passage, Edward had said. A bit of harmless fun that she would soon get to be on the other side of, Faustus told her. Everyone did it, Shirley assured her. 

Zelda Spellman marched into her first week at the Academy of Unseen Arts with a fire in her heart to match the fire of her hair. Pure determination and ambition, with sharp eyes and a quick tongue, even at a mere eleven years old. She would be the best witch ever to pass through the Academy, she had made up her mind. And besides, as Edward was showing such promise only a few years ahead of her, she had a reputation to live up to. She would not tarnish the Spellman name, nor would she follow along in her brother's shadow. No, Zelda Spellman had plans of her own. And if her means to the end of accomplishing those plans was a few nights of what they called "Harrowing", that seemed a small price to pay. 

The first night, she had been dragged from her bed and thrown into the Witch's Cell with another girl her age. From the moment the door had locked from the outside, the other girl had screamed and screamed, but Zelda sat calmly in the far corner until the next morning. The spirits inhabiting the Cell soon learned that they would get next to nothing from the redhead, and focused their attention instead on tormenting her cell mate. The other girl was still crying come morning, but when the door was unbolted, Zelda sauntered out with her nose in the air, only a smudge or two of dirt to show for her time in the Cell. 

The second night, she had been placed in a ring encircling the Hanging Tree, young witches and warlocks facing the massive trunk of the gnarled tree. Their only instructions were to stand until dawn , and to never turn around. So Zelda did not. The growling noises from behind her raised every hair on the back of her neck and sent chills down her spine, but she stood perfectly still. She watched as first one and then two of the other children turned their heads to glance behind them, and she saw them lifted into the air and snatched backwards, hurtling into the woods like screaming rag dolls. The only move she made over the course of the night was to wipe angrily at a tear as it escaped her eye, her father's echoed voice behind her. No matter how hard you may try, you will never be your brother. In the pale light of dawn, she trudged back to the Academy alongside her classmates, stoney-faced though shivering slightly. 

The third night would be special, she'd heard. Tailored for each individual student by those who knew them. Again summoned from her bed, she went willingly. Though she was a year younger than Shirley, she was slightly taller, Zelda noted with a smirk as she followed just behind the other girl. The night was cold as they walked away from the Academy, and seemed to grow colder still as they approached the woods. Zelda pulled her dressing gown tighter around her body. 

When they reached the clearing, the boys were already waiting for them. Faustus looked up from placing thick candles on the ground as she approached, giving her a polite bow and a leering grin. Edward greeted her with no more than a nod and a small smile, which she returned. She was determined to make him proud tonight. 

As she glanced around the clearing, she noticed that the others had brought supplies. A pile of rounded stones, flattened into ovals and stacked neatly, sat atop the fallen autumn leaves. Something in her stomach tightened as she saw the rope that lay next to the stones- one end of it had been tied around itself to form a noose. And in front of that lay a grimoire, its cover dark leather with fading silver print marking it as a spell book. 

"Let Shirley take your robe," her brother murmured. She obediently untied the knotted sash around her waist and allowed Shirley to pull it away from her shoulders and down her arms, doing her best to repress a shiver as the midnight air rushed to creep through the sleeves of her nightgown. "The slippers, too," Edward added, and she stepped out of them. Her feet met damp and brittle leaves, and a breath of wind played with the hem of her nightgown around her ankles. 

Having placed the last candle to complete the ring, Faustus stepped back and nodded at Edward. Her brother extended an upturned hand to her and Zelda took it, allowing him to steady her as she stepped over the candles and into the circle. The young witch suddenly felt very alone as her brother released her hand, but she was determined not to show it. 

_"Lucis et flammae,"_ Edward commanded, beckoning fire up with a curling of his fingers as the candles lit themselves at once. _"Et oblinito circulo"._ Zelda knew immediately that the spell had bound her in the circle, likely until either the candles were extinguished or the spell was reversed by its caster. 

"Now, Zelda," spoke her brother, his voice both familiar and slightly unnerving to the redhead. "You know that the past two nights have focused on honoring the Greendale Thirteen, knowing their struggles and sharing their suffering. Tonight, we will continue with this endeavor, as we turn now to the Thirteen's final night as captives of the mortals." 

"They were disrobed, as you have been," Shirley chimed, stepping forward. "Left to the mercy of the night air. Barefoot, they were marched into these woods, bound and jeered at by mortals on every side. And if one of them dared to look a mortal in the eye? Well..." Her sentence halted, but her point was made by the sudden movement of her hand and a sharp stinging in Zelda's shoulder. 

Momentarily preoccupied with the pain, Zelda's eyes soon found the culprit- one of the stones from the pile now lay near her feet. Raising her head to look at the others, she had little more than a breath to steel herself. Her arms flew up to shield her face as a hit landed on her thigh, her ribs, her foot. Out of the corner of her eye, she glimpsed Shirley give a particularly forceful throw, and she gasped sharply as the rock connected with her brow bone. Edward, bless him, seemed to be aiming mostly for her feet and ankles, his gentleness in throwing a direct contrast to the act itself. Shirley and Faustus however, they pelted her with everything they had. But even as she wiped away the blood dripping into her eye, Zelda resolutely stood her ground. 

When at last the stones of the pile all lay scattered around Zelda on the leaf-strewn earth, the young witch was bleeding and bruised, but she knew the night was far from over. She wondered what would be used next- the rope or the grimoire- but she had the answer to her question only a moment after she had thought it. Faustus's shoes stepped into the sightline of her downturned gaze, and stilled directly before her. She kept her eyes on the laces of his boots, lest she be beaten with another rock if she looked up at him. 

"You know what comes next, Zelda," he murmured, and she feared that she did. Still, she gasped in spite of herself as she felt the noose land around her shoulders, heavy and damp, rough against the tender skin of her neck. She heard rather than saw the other end of the rope tossed over a treebranch above her, and her heart began to race as she felt the loop around her neck lift to press against her chin. Her head snapped up to look Faustus in the eye, and she fought the urge to bring her hands up and pull the rope away from her skin. 

"Having been paraded through town and into the forest," he continued, his smirk sending an icy shiver down Zelda's spine. "The Greendale Thirteen were each positioned beneath a branch of that great, ancient tree, and each of them felt the weight of the noose around their shoulders. Then, without trial and without rites, they were hanged by the neck. Until dead. And with this act, we honor their sacrifice." 

And suddenly, there was no ground beneath her feet. All of the budding nervousness that she had shoved down so efficiently came surging up all at once, escalating instantaneously into absolute panic. She kicked wildly against the night air and her hands flew up to claw at her neck, trying in desperation to loosen the rope. Her lungs burned with the need for oxygen, but she could not breathe, and her heartbeat thundered in her ears, blocking out all other sound. She could not breathe, and she could not see the others on the ground, and she had trusted Edward not to let her get hurt, but she was going to die here, at the end of this rope, because she could not _breathe._ Her arms slowed and dropped to her sides, too heavy for her to hold them up any longer. The tree branches were fuzzy, and seemed to be growing darker, deep shadows overtaking them. Perhaps this is what it feels like to fly, she wondered vaguely. She felt she was flying, but she could not think why the tree branches were moving away from her. 

As close to unconsciousness as she was, the impact of the ground was not as harsh as it might have been otherwise. And then air ripped into her lungs, even before she had registered the noose being thrown from her neck by a wave of Edward's hand. Gulping in great gasps of breath, her body was on fire as the life returned to it, her head pounding. 

"What in Satan's name do you think you're doing, Faustus?" Edward shouted, having shoved the younger boy nearly to the ground in an effort to get him to let go of the rope. 

"Oh, do calm down, Edward. It's not as if she's died." 

"You, my boy," he spoke, pulling Faustus upright by the shirtfront. "Are dangerously close to making me lose my temper. And we wouldn't want that, now would we?" Edward thrust the other boy away from him roughly before turning to approach the circle where his sister lay, still struggling for breath and clutching at her wounded throat, marred by scratches from her own fingernails. "Zelda. Zelda, look at me." With some effort, she lifted her gaze to meet Edward's when he knelt beside the candles. His heart sunk as he saw nothing but terror in her eyes. "It's alright now, you're alright, it's over. I'll take..." 

Halting his words, Edward turned at the sound of chanted Latin behind him. _"Ad ligandum eos pariter eos coram me."_

"What are you doing?" he rose and stepped towards Faustus and Shirley, who held the weathered grimoire between them, evidently reading an incantation. 

_"Offerimus tibi hoc puella puer."_ The two seemed undeterred by Edward's question. _"Nunc age. Ego vocare vobis."_

"Stop! Stop that this instant!" Edward shouted, but they continued.

_"Tolle illud, quod vestrum est! Ego vocare vobis! Ego vocare vobis!"_ Their shouts echoed through the trees, and the woods fell silent, not a rustle of leaves or a hooting owl to be heard. 

And then Zelda screamed. The others watched wide-eyed as she writhed within the circle, her body contorting in apparent pain. But when she spoke, it was not her own voice coming from her throat. It was deep and animalistic, chilling Edward to the core. 

_"Emi winokre Nebratron em hemitus eni nüllaan!"_ The other voice roared from Zelda. 

"What is she saying?" Faustus questioned, fighting to be heard over the redhead's continued shouts.

"I don't know, I don't know the language!" replied Shirley, looking back at the book in her hands for an explanation. 

"What have you done?" the older boy all but yelled, fixing the two with a fiery glare. 

"A- a summoning," stammered the girl as Edward lunged for the book. "We... we summoned a demon." 

"You invited a _demon_ into my _sister?!"_

"Oh, Satan!" Shirley gasped, and all heads snapped back in the direction of the circle. Zelda was rising, suspended in the air with her spine arching towards the sky, and the horrible voice still pouring unknown words into the forest. 

_"Ratsni etsai hemitusi enis: itsi yenvagreni wesrat hor fensteru em tekhes!"_

"Get out of here, now!" Edward seized the grimoire and pushed Shirley and Faustus towards the path they had entered by. Overtaken by true fear of what they had done, they both took off running without needing to be told twice, leaving Edward searching frantically through the book for a spell of banishment or exorcism. 

_"Itsi yenvagreni wesrat an sha’ami entsai khedekareb!"_

"Leave her alone, leave my sister alone! _Ego mitto vos, haec relinquere corpus! Esse abiit, esse abiit!"_ He switched into Latin to combat the foreign tongue, but seemingly to no avail.

_"Etsoo lipieem adzigrosen. Etsoon kaamplen sha’am tweraam. Itsi yenvagreni wesrat an sha’ami entsai khedekareb!"_

"Zelda!" he called, panicking as he could not find anything in the grimoire about exorcising a demon. 

"No!" shrieked the girl in her own voice. In the piercing scream that followed, Edward heard in one breath his sister's voice melding with the demon's and returning to her own again. Moments after only her voice remained, she plummeted to the ground for the second time that night. She lay motionless against the leaves as Edward scrambled to get to her. With a thrust of his palm, he extinguished the candles at once before knocking them to the side to break the circle. 

"Zelda?" He murmured, the sound tremulous. Blinking back tears, he dropped down beside her and gathered her in his arms. "Zelda?" he tried again, somewhat stronger. Her eyes fluttered open, drawing a gasp from him. 

"Edward?" Her whisper was small and frightened. 

"I'm here, I'm here, you're alright. It's over, you're alright." 

"Did... did I do well?" 

"Oh my dear, dear Zelda," he spoke, brushing a dirt-coated curl out of her eyes. "Yes, you did very well." 

She nodded in acceptance, a tiny sob escaping her. Her brother clutched her tighter as she cried into his chest. He could not believe that she had thrown a demon out of her own body, a feat he did not know was possible, and at only eleven years old. 

"I cleanse the mind, I cleanse the heart, let frightful thoughts of night depart," he whispered into her hair. _"Munda mens, munda cor, timidus cogitationes ire."_

"Edward?" she questioned, but he was quick to calm her. 

"Hush now, sleep. _Somnus."_ She slumped against his shoulder, the charm lulling her instantly into slumber. He carried her back to the Academy, silent tears streaking his face.

Edward did his very best with the memory spell, but he was not quite sure how effective it had been. Zelda never brought it up, and he had sworn Faustus and Shirley to silence. But two years later, the redhead was downright ruthless during their sister Hilda's Harrowing, and he thought it must have been in misdirected retaliation against him. 

Zelda never spoke of that night to anyone. But more than a century later, it was Sabrina being Harrowed, and she stood in Faustus's office to look him in the eye and call the Harrowings of their youth nothing but spirited child's play, though she knew precisely what his eyes had looked like just before he had lifted her off the ground by the noose. That night, she gave Hilda a long-overdue apology after seeing the ghost children, knowing full well that she herself might have joined their ranks if Edward had not made Faustus let go of the rope. And a matter of weeks later, when Ms Wardwell sat in the parlor and spoke of a witch's exorcism rite written by Edward, she knew why he had written it. Relying on the power of the individual witch, the rite was to atone for what Zelda had gone through that night, and to ensure that it never happened to anyone again, for not all demons have the limited power of school children summoning them. 

Over the years, the memories of the Harrowing became just another event, just another night to push down and tuck away in a darkened corner of her mind, where it was in good company. For Zelda Spellman had always held many secrets, even at eleven years old.


End file.
